Newsom “a joke” to Democratic insiders?

Mayor Gavin Newsom’s press folks were all atwitter when a Newsweek reporter came to town earlier this month to write a profile of the gubernatorial hopeful. But they’ve been strangely quiet since the article, “Hoping that Left is Right,” hit the news stands last week.

Why the nothing-to-see-here attitude? For starters, the Newsweek article only gets to the third sentence before mentioning that after “divorcing a knockout TV anchorwoman, he had an affair with his campaign manager’s wife, an affair Newsom admitted to before then marrying a 34-year-old actress.”

Later in that same paragraph, Newsom’s infamous “whether you like it or not” growl and the ensuing Prop. 8 win gets a mention. “How did Newsom let this happen to himself?…Once viewed as a young man in a hurry, Newsom has become a joke to Democratic insiders, a man whose bright national future ended before it began.” Ouch.

Newsom’s campaign strategist Eric Jaye said he was perfectly happy with the article.

“It was a thoughtful article, and we’ve had a lot of positive feedback to it,” he said. “We live in a world in which if they’re not talking about Gavin Newsom, they’re talking about Jerry Brown, and we prefer the former to the latter.”

And that “joke to Democratic insiders” comment?

“It’s what matters to constituents and to voters that is driving his decision making, and that’s where he’s staying focused,” Jaye said.